“Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted; the indifference of those who should have known better; the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most; that has made it possible for evil to triumph.”
Haile Selassie

Thursday, May 5, 2016

With General Election Now in his Sights, Trump Reverses His Position on Minimum Wage, Taxes; Says He Will Consider A Democrat for VP

Would it be impolite to tell the Trump supporters, "I told you so?" MSNBC reports:

Two days into his general election campaign, Donald Trump has already signaled he may abandon his positions on two major policy issues: a minimum wage increase and tax cuts for the rich.

Trump’s willingness to blithely abandon past positions has made conservative activists deeply skeptical, but it also presents a general election challenge for Democrats: How do you hold a candidate accountable for his positions after he has looked Americans in the eyes during a debate and, with a straight face, denied he ever held contrary views?

Take taxes. Trump put out a tax plan last year that included major cuts to income, estate and business taxes for the ultra-wealthy along with far less generous cuts for the middle class. The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimated his plan would cut the tax bill for the top 1 percent of earners by about $275,000 a year on average and for the top 0.1 percent by $1.3 million. The overall cost would be $9.5 trillion over a decade.

...

It’s important to note that these disproportionately large cuts for the rich aren’t a minor side feature of his plan, they’re the heart of it. A whopping 67 percent of the overall cost of his individual tax cuts would go to the top 20 percent of earners and 35 percent of it would go to the top 1 percent, according to the Tax Policy Center’s analysis.

Trump’s abrupt dismissal of his own tax plan, which he regularly cited on the campaign trail, came a day after he signaled a possible willingness to raise the federal minimum wage, which would be a major reversal from his stance in the primaries.

“I am open to doing something with it, because I don’t like that,” Trump told CNN on Wednesday after being asked if he thought the $7.25 minimum wage should be increased.

Trump added that “you have to have something that you can live on” and that his willingness to entertain a wage increase showed he was “very different from most Republicans.” At the same time, he said he would prefer to try to raise wages through economic growth.

This was, to put it mildly, a complete flip flop from his position in the primaries. He repeatedly argued that raising the minimum would move jobs to countries like China. Speaking in the cold language of a businessman looking at his bottom line, Trump even seemed to indicate overall American wages, regardless of the law, were too generous already.

“Taxes too high, wages too high, we’re not going to be able to compete against the world,” Trump said in a November debate hosted by Fox Business.

Trump clarified afterwards that he did not believe American wages were too high, but he did make crystal clear he was fundamentally opposed to a minimum wage increase.

“We were talking about the minimum wage, and they said, ‘Should we increase the minimum wage?’ ” Trump told Fox News after the debate. “And I’m saying that if we’re going to compete with other countries we can’t do that because the wages would be too high.”

Of course, Trump will deny he ever took positions on the other side of the issues. Even when you have him on videotape stating a contrary position,Trump will brand anyone as a "liar" anyone who points out the evidence he changed his position.

This comes at the same time as the news breaks that Trump might consider a Democrat for Vice-President.

Expect the next policy flip to be an announcement that Trump has now converted back to his previous pro-choice position and wants to continue funding Planned Parenthood.

3 comments:

Paul: Rush picked up on this today & suggested the LSM is spinning his positions to undermine support. Let's hope he's right. Is there a Democrat you could see as a viable VP (a serious & not a setup question)?

About Me

I have been an attorney since the Fall of 1987. I have worked in every branch of government, including a stint as a Deputy Attorney General, a clerk for a judge on the Indiana Court of Appeals, and I have worked three sessions at the Indiana State Senate.
During my time as a lawyer, I have worked not only in various government positions, but also in private practice as a trial attorney handing an assortment of mostly civil cases.
I have also been politically active and run this blog in an effort to add my voice to those calling for reform.